The US bishops do not endorse candidates. Tax-exempt churches are prohibited from doing so, and the bishops don’t want to alienate people in the pews, who are divided along partisan lines.
Catholic theology also understands the clergy’s proper role in elections as an indirect influencer, said Chad C. Pecknold, a theologian at The Catholic University of America. Bishops and priests are teachers of conscience. They don’t tell people whom to vote for, but rather how to use their God-given free will and well-formed conscience for the common good.
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